Park Slope

Park Slope is a neighborhood of northwest Brooklyn, New York City. During the 1860s, the city of Brooklyn purchased Park Slope from a landowner and began to develop the area, and an armory was built in Park Slope in 1893; the neighborhood was also home to the Brooklyn Atlantics, a baseball team that would later become the "Dodgers". The neighborhood was wealthy for decades, although urban sprawl on the part of the Italian and Irish populations during the 1950s led to lower-income Hispanic and African-American families settling in the area. Ethnic tensions were high, and fourteen African-Americans and three Italian-Americans were arrested after having a gang fight in 1968. During the 1980s, the area was affected by daily muggings and shootings, although gentrification began to pick up pace in the late 1980s. In 2010, it was named the most desirable neighborhood in New York City by New York Magazine, as the area had improved significantly since the 1980s. In 2000, Park Slope had a population of 65,047 people.